The roles of men and women are among the many elements of contemporary American society which are in a process of rapid and sometimes disruptive change. The more or less traditional ways in which men and women have viewed themselves and each other are being openly challenged by a number of significant factors. Although there have always been those exceptional persons who questioned the inevitability of seemingly given role differentiation, today’s social climate makes such questioning more common and acceptable. A few specific factors may be mentioned as being particular interest. With modern communication and mobility, the options for varied educational and employment opportunities and life styles available to both men and women have vastly increased. In a world threatened with overpopulation, there has appeared a marked decrease in family size expectations. Further, increasingly open challenges are being offered to the idea of inevitability and/or desirability of the nuclear family as the ideal life style for all persons. The modern Women’s Movement has spoken to all of the above issues and has added the unique dimension of heightened awareness of past and present role allocation for women and its associated critique of what society has apportioned to men as well. Cooperative households provide one form of intimate social organizations in which sex roles, in some form, will be expressed. It is the intent of this study to focus upon perceptions of sext roles within contemporary cooperative households. Generally, we wish to know whether or not certain group or individual factors are associated with the development of sex role patterns. If they are associated, in what ways? If they are associated, will this enable us to develop more focused questions which could be investigated in similar settings outside the population sample? Finally, we will examine whether our data and observations raise questions for further inquiry regarding sex role patterns within the nuclear family and/or society in general. As social workers we hope to gain some understanding of ways in which life in a cooperative household may provide one alternative among many for those seeking to develop roles which reflect their uniqueness as persons.

The central research question of the current study had to do with self - an stereotypically- gendered identities of lesbians. The purpose was to determine the nature and form of gender identity and gender stereotypes among women who self-identify as lesbians, and more specifically, to determine whether or not “gender” means the same to lesbians as it does to heterosexual women. Identity measures were Bern’s (1974) Sex-role Inventory (BSRI) and a butch-femme rating scale. The sample consisted of 65 women who self-identified as lesbian. The lesbians in the current sample did identify more strongly with masculine attributes (Masculinity scale mean = 5.27) than with feminine attributes (Femininity scale means= 5.07). Interestingly, the current sample’s mean Masculinity scores were higher than those of women (heterosexual orientation unknown, and lesbians) in prior research. The majority of butches and femmes identified as masculine and feminine, respectively. As indicated from prior research subjects, and even more strongly among the lesbians in this study, traits such as “cheerful,” “shy,” “flatterable,” “childlike,” “does not use harsh language,” and “lives children” may no longer be self-descriptions of lesbians or heterosexual women. The lesbians in this study described themselves as assertive and independent and also as nurturant and sensitive. It may be that the terms like “agency” and “emphatic” will in the future be more useful than the dichotomized masculine and feminine labels.

studies have examined children's toy preferences as they relate to sex-role development. However, studies have failed to examine the dimensions of the toys themselves. Because adults purchase the majority of toys children receive, this study sought to determine adult student perceptions of children's traditionally sex-typed toys. Eighty-one participants rated ten selected toys. Multidimensional scaling analysis revealed five underlying dimensions. The five dimensions included Productive Play, Sociability, Structure, Gender, and Age. It was discovered that the Gender dimension was less salient than both the Productive Play and Sociability dimensions. The dimensions pertaining to each toy are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to develop and evaluate a scale that measures more accurate and flexible gender role representations of Black women regarding themselves and others. Scholars have called for the development of gender role instruments that measure more culturally relevant interpretations of masculinity and femininity (Dade & Sloan, 2000; Miville, 2013). Instruments that incorporate traditional Euro-centric notions of gender roles do not account well for the unique racial-ethnic contexts that likely influence how Black women construct gender as well as perpetuate the misrepresentation of black femininity, the justification of negative stereotypes of Black women (e.g., the Mammy, Jezebel and Sapphire), and the exclusion of Black women from healthy expressions of womanhood (Dade & Sloan, 2000; Harris, 1994). This study referred to the Multicultural Gender Roles Model (MGRM; Miville, Bratini, Corpus, Lau, and Redway, 2013) in an effort to better describe the gendered experiences Black women. The Multicultural Gender Roles Scale - Black Women (MGRS-BW) reflected a 22 Likert-type item scale reflecting a 3-factor structure. Reliability and construct validity was established in several ways: expert ratings, alpha coefficients, and exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Implications for future research and clinical applications also were presented.

Based on analyses of recorded real-life social interactions among English men and women friends living in England, this study shows how crucial it is to use a range of communication behaviours to express humour and maintain rapport. Men and women are keen to learn how to improve and preserve their social relationships (Mulac, Bradac and Gibbons, 2001). However, the immense literature on human communication ignores the multifaceted and positive force of humour in the social interactions of friends (Lynch, 2002). In addition, there is an absence of firm theoretical principles on which to develop counselling sessions and teach individuals to develop humour skills. Therefore, this study examines how participants incorporate humour in their ongoing conversation to achieve rapport in face-to-face social interaction in mixed-gender groups. This investigation is situated within the fields of human communication and humour and gender research. The necessarily communicative approach involved qualitative data collection and description, namely conversation analysis (CA) and ethnography, complemented by quantitative analysis. Communication context, that is, interactants’ attitudes and personality, their history, background knowledge, and how they relate to each other, are shown to play an important role in preserving friendships and maintaining rapport. Light is thrown on specific behaviours that could help men and women nurture their friendships and it is explained why there is a need for individuals to view humour as a positive force in their communication with one another. It is argued that misunderstandings may arise if men and women do not understand the way each gender uses humour. Thus, men and women could empower themselves by objectively examining how they interact, challenge the perceptions each may have about their own communication, and gain a more thorough understanding of verbal and non-verbal strategies for facilitating humour. By harmonising their verbal and non-verbal behaviours, men and women can use humour not only to express affiliation and commonality but also as a strategy for testing the boundaries of gender in a non-threatening way, to minimise differences, and to discover more about the opposite gender. In time and with further academic inquiry, humour could be acknowledged as a critical communication tool for establishing and sustaining relationships. The hope is that this study could be a catalyst for future research on promoting humour as a key element of daily social interaction. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between self-aspects, sources of workplace satisfaction and types of organisational commitment. This study tested three expectations. The first was that employees with strongly developed relational self-aspects who find satisfaction in workplace relationships with their direct managers and colleagues were likely to experience affective committed towards their organisation. The second was that employees with strongly developed individual selfaspects who find satisfaction in the job itself were likely to experience continuance commitment towards their organisation. The third was that employees with strongly developed collective self-aspects who find satisfaction in the organisation as well as its senior management were likely to experience normative committed towards their organisation. To test these hypotheses, three empirical studies were conducted. In Study 1 respondents (N = 140) were drawn from a large aged care nursing facility. Using separate regression analyses, support was found for the expectation that relational self-aspects would predict satisfaction with colleague relationships and that satisfaction with colleague and manager relationships would predict affective commitment. Support was also found for the expectation that collective self-aspects would predict satisfaction with the organisation and its senior management, however only satisfaction with the organisation was found to predict normative commitment. The expected relationship between individual self-aspects, job satisfaction and continuance commitment was not supported. It was argued that the strong relational nature of the sample and the high percentage (87%) of females within the sample may have influenced the results. Study 2 was designed to reconfirm the expected relationship between sources of workplace satisfaction and types of organisational commitment using a broader sample. Respondents (N = 146; females =86, males = 60) were drawn from four sources; a credit co-op, an adventure based training organisation, a commercial cleaning organisation, and a Graduate School of Business. As expected, satisfaction with colleague relationships was a significant predictor of affective commitment, while a non-significant trend was observed for satisfaction with manager relationships. Some support was found for the expectation that job satisfaction would be a significant predictor of continuance commitment through an observed non-significant trend. Satisfaction with the organisation was a significant predictor of normative commitment, while satisfaction with senior management was not. The influence of gender on these results were also examined and discussed. The purpose of Study 3 was to introduce a newly developed work specific selfaspects scale and test the integrated model that examined the relationship between three types of self-aspects, three sources of workplace satisfaction on three types of organisational commitment. The influence of gender was also examined and discussed. Respondents (N= 119) were drawn from an Australian financial institution. Using standard regression analysis to test the model, it was found that collective work selfaspects together with satisfaction with colleague and manager relationships were the only predictors of affective commitment, while collective work self-aspects together with satisfaction with the organisation were the only predictors of normative commitment. No support was found for the expectation that individual self-aspects together with job satisfaction would significantly predict continuous commitment. The results of this research provided some support for the view that the strength of an employee's self-aspects may determine the type of workplace experiences they are likely to find satisfying. Furthermore, these sources of workplace satisfaction are likely to lead to different forms of organisational commitment. It was argued that the results observed across the three studies may have been influenced by organisational context. It was suggested that further research should sample a broader range of organisations in order to test the validity of the integrated model.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of Sociology, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references.

<p>Syftet med denna undersökning har varit att granska några föräldrars tankar kring genus- och jämställdhetsarbete i förskolan. Med hjälp av enkäter och intervjuer har vi samlat in vårt empiriska material. I enkätundersökningen var deltagandet lågt vilket kan tyda på ett svalt intresse för dessa frågor bland föräldrarna. Intervjupersonerna var dock av den uppfattningen att genus- och jämställdhetsarbete i förskolan är något av stor vikt. Intervjupersonerna var eniga både vad gäller den negativa inställningen till enkönade grupper i förskolan och vikten av förebilder av båda könen bland förskolans personal. Alla föräldrar betonade samhällets och miljöns påverkan på barnens subjektivitetsskapande även om en del menade att det också finns betydande biologiska skillnader mellan flickor och pojkar. När vi bearbetade vårt empiriska material och studerade föräldrarnas uttalanden på djupet tyckte vi oss dock kunna se att samhällets rådande föreställningar om könen som två olika sorter ofta lyser igenom. Vi tror att det är svårt att tänka bortom den rådande diskursen om könen men menar att en viktig del av genus- och jämställdhetsarbetet handlar om att synliggöra de rådande föreställningar som finns och diskutera vad de kan innebära i praktiken.</p><p>The purpose of this survey has been to relate some parents’ thoughts regarding gender and equal opportunity for boys and girls within the preschool program. Our empiric data was collected through questionnaires and interviews. The result of completed and returned questionnaires was lower than expected which may indicate a slackened interest in the topic among the parents. The interviewees however, were in general of the opinion that the gender and equal opportunity within the preschool are of great importance. The interviewees as a group preferred gender mixed groups to single sex groups for their children and also emphasized the importance of both male and female teachers. Even though some parents thought there may be significant biological differences between boys and girls the parents stressed the influence of society and environment on children’s creation of their subjectivity. After a deep review of the collected data, it appears that the general view of the sexes as two different kinds is affecting the parents in their thoughts. We believe that it is difficult to reach beyond the present discourse about the sexes. According to us, it is however important to keep the gender and equality discussion alive and relate common views and opinions with what they can lead to in practice.</p>

This thesis outlines dominant ideologies and practices that affect women's authority in the urban social milieu of north India. Theories that consider the causes of social stratification by gender as well as social movement patterns are useful for understanding the durability of gender roles. The utility of these theories for understanding the patterns of social organization in India is discussed. Additionally, I report on interviews I conducted with police, non-governmental organization founders and individuals who are involved in and affected by women's issues, in order to outline potential variations in existing practices. In urban India, traditional and contemporary social practices meld into a proscribed, often volatile cultural setting in which women's roles are stringently defined. In the city of New Delhi, reports of "bride burnings" or murders attributed to family conflicts over dowry have surfaced during the last decades of the 2O century, and resulting protest movements have sparked governmental and grass-roots level reforms. Extreme cases of violence against women are indicative of troublesome cultural ideologies, including the social and economic devaluation of women. Urbanization has intensified financial negotiations in marriage alliances, and a woman's social worth is increasingly measured according to her market value. A Women's Movement comprised of various interest groups has contributed to the dialog on the social climate of north India, and feminist advocates have sought to redefine women's roles. Within the hierarchical structure of the Hindu culture, concepts of kinship and community take precedence over personal agendas, and social action is thus driven by family values as well as movement ideologies. State policies designed to address social ills such as domestic violence are ineffectual because they do not address the extant causes of abuse or constraints against women. Independent organizations and activist groups have recognized the need to work within traditional norms in order to advance women's movement objectives, despite the restrictions inherent within patriarchy. These tactics risk accomplishing little social change, and may at times perpetuate practices that limit women's activity. / Graduation date: 2000

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Georgia State University, 2006. / Title from title screen. Y. Barry Chung, committee chair; Joel Meyers, Leslie Jackson, Catherine Y. Chang, committee members. Electronic text (104 p.) : digital, PDF file. Description based on contents viewed Apr. 19, 2007. Includes bibliographical references.